Noticing
by Graysi
Summary: Just another evening spent at school, practising 'ping pong' and Tori's picked possibly the worst movie EVER. Jade's a little late and Beck phones her to see where she's at. And Beck.. he's fine. He's Beck, being his cucumber cool self. Nothing's wrong at all. No need to freak out. Bade. Sorry this is awful. Don't read it. No, I'm lying, do. But it is bad.


_Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry._  
Most _of the stories I have up here so far, I'm at least _halfway _proud of, but this, just …I don't know. There's something _off _about it, like a depressing streak in it that I can't get rid of, like they're all a bunch of worried, intense characters with no happiness _whatsoever. _I might go back and delete/edit this later, if I can't think of how to fix it, or if I _can_ think of how to fix it._  
_The concept for this was, that Jade always notices if something is upsetting Beck, like straight away. It was originally meant for Beck to be the one who notices something with Jade, but like all my stories are like that so I decided to mix it up a little. Sigh. Sorry again. I'm unhappy._  
_And I don't own Victorious._

* * *

It's seven forty five and they've gathered in the common room upstairs at school to practice ping pong. By watching TV and ordering KFC.

"André, pass me the bucket of chicken." Beck instructs, holding out his hand.  
"No!" he objects. "It's _my _chicken pieces." Beck turns to look at him, sitting on the beanbag, his hand drowning in the bucket. Beck sighs.  
"Fine. Don't come crying to me when your cholesterol level reaches dangerous levels." He warns.  
"Hey Tori?" asks Robbie.  
"Yeah?" Her legs are crossed, resting on the coffee table in front of her.  
"What exactly are we watching?" She turns to the screen.  
"Oh. _Well_, it's called Aliens Take Teenage Vampire Party Beach 4 and –"  
"It's not good." He states. She looks up, dolefully.  
"_Why_?" she whines. "It's so funny! Me and André picked it, and it –"  
"It's not funny Tori." Beck interjects. "Really. It's _awful_."  
"What? Well Cat thinks it's funny, look!" she objects, and points to Cat who's lying in front of the TV, clutching her stomach and laughing, for so far, about ten minutes straight.  
"Yeah, well Cat laughs at _ravioli_." Beck points out.

André pulls out a perfectly clean bone out his mouth and turns to Beck.  
"Ehh weh, werse shayn?" he asks, his mouth stuffed with chicken.  
"What? …Hey where's..? Oh just eat the chicken before you speak!" André nods obediently, chewing rapidly, making Tori squeeze her eyes shut in disgust.  
"I _said_," he continues, swallowing, "Where's yo girl Jade at?" he inquires. Beck frowns, reaching for his phone.  
"Oh. I dunno. She's not called me. How late is she?" He looks at Tori.  
"Uh... well I told everyone to be here at seven." She glances at the clock on the wall. "She's nearly forty five minutes late." She bites her lip anxiously. "Is everything okay.. y'know with Jade?"  
He nods but then looks at her.  
"Why makes you say that?" he frowns, lifting the phone to his ear to call Jade. Tori shakes her head in rebuttal.  
"No, no I wasn't suggesting there was, I was just worried because –"  
"Hey Jade?" he cut her off.  
"…she hasn't called." Tori finishes. She sighs and turns off the volume on the TV so Beck can hear.

She turns to the TV and her eyes drift to the shaking figure on the ground.  
"Cat! Why are you still laughing?" she asks, smiling at Cat's contagious and childish giggles. "It's been_ fifteen minutes_."  
"I just – can't help it!" She laughs again. "It's so funny!" And sits up, laughing like a two year old in a fit of hysteria.  
"C'mon Cat, you'll give yourself another tummy-ache." Robbie warns, like a concerned, fussy older brother. "Try to think of something serious! Like briefcases. Or canned soup." But it only makes Cat laugh harder.  
"Canned soup?" Tori repeats, looking at Robbie like he forgot what _lemons_ were.  
"Yeah. It's soup that's stored in a cold metal cylinder. What's more serious than _that_?"  
"Man, I want some canned soup." André says, to no-one in particular, for once holding back on his chicken pieces.  
She sighs and ignores him, turning back to Beck who's sitting on the armchair in the corner.

"At my _house_? What are you even _doing_ there?" Beck's eyes are wide listening to his girlfriend's answer.  
"No, no no-no-no , don't do that! Just get in your car, and drive here." He sounds worried and André frowns. "Just. Go to your car Jade. _Now._ …Please?"  
He sighs in reaction to her response, almost as if in relief and runs his hand through his hair.  
"Yeah. Like forty five minutes ago. We're watching... Tori what's it called again?" he asks taking the phone from his ear. She repeats it to him and he lifts the phone again to tell Jade.  
"Oh yeah. It's called Aliens Take Teenage Vampire Party Beach 4." He bursts out laughing at something she says.  
"Uh… _No_ Jade. I _don't_ think I'll say _that_ to her." He chuckles, glancing at Tori. She scowls and turns away.  
"_And,_ I'm being mocked." She concludes, nodding.

The room's pretty quiet now, what with the lack of volume on the TV, and André being busy eating his chicken, and Cat's laughs being smothered by the carpet and Robbie's observations of her to make sure she doesn't suffocate, so Tori has nothing better to do that to eavesdrop on Beck talking to his girlfriend, because she's just so _inquisitive_ like that, she can't _help_ it.  
"Yeah I'm fine. Why do say that?" Beck asks Jade, looking confused.  
"My _tone_?" he asks incredulously. "Okay how's this?" he asks talking in a New Yorker accent.  
The gang can hear Jade's open, carefree laugh through the phone, that they almost never get to hear and André smiles in reaction, almost in reflex.  
"Right Jade, I'll see you in a minute. Drive safe." He smiles at something she says and then hangs up the phone.

"She'll be here in like five minutes. Her dad just showed up at the last minute." He says neutrally, in monotone.  
André looks up hastily and Beck looks at him briefly and nods once. André turns away and rubs his hand to his forehead.  
"But didn't you say that she was at _your_ house?" Tori asks, confused.  
"Yeah... She was just checking if I needed picking up. She didn't realise how late it was."  
"Oh" says Tori, pacified, getting up and walking to the microwave as it's shrill ring sounds. André bursts out laughing.  
"You're girlfriend drives to _your_ house to pick _you_ up?" he laughs. "Very manly." He compliments.  
Beck looks at him silently, and pretend-offended, until his laughter dies away.  
"Excuse me, but I _happen_ to be the most masculine out of all of you." He contradicts.  
"Well, _I_ for one, would probably better count my blessings on that score." Tori grins. "Okay, so I've got hot dogs _and_ taco fries!" She announces, pleased with herself and she walks over to the boys with a bowl of each in her hands.

"I want the hot dogs!" André shouts immediately, just in case anyone else would claim them, looking around suspiciously like his grandma. Tori laughs.  
"For _André_." She says, settling them next to his bucket of chicken.  
"And Beck, I know how much you love taco fries so, there you go." And she places them on the little table next to him. He nods at her in thanks.  
Robbie looks up expectantly at Tori, as if anticipating that she also has his favourite meal (stuffed cabbage), clasping his hands together and crossing his legs.  
Tori, noticing avoids his eyes and points out to the window, where the headlights of Jade's car light up the school porch.  
"That must be Jade now."

Beck looks toward the window being quiet and stares out as if he's waiting for Jade to come up.  
Tori plunges into the sofa behind André's beanbag and reaches into the bag of fries from earlier, to throw, yet _another_ fry, to the back of André's head.  
"Hey! That's like the fiftieth one! I bruise easily woman" he complains, turning his head to look at her.  
"From fluffy potato mush?" she questions dubiously.  
She laughs at him, kicking his shoulder with her toe, but her laughter is drowned out by the sound of heels, walking up the stairs.

The door bursts open, and there's Jade, wearing a short, long sleeved black dress, with black tight and black heels.  
"_Hey_ guys." She says, like she just made their day by walking through the door. A few 'hi's and 'hey Jade's and 'hahahah-hi!'s are thrown back at her.  
She glances down at Cat who's still giggling on the floor. She looks up at Tori for an explanation. Tori sighs exasperatedly, but still a little amused.  
"Oh, she's just been laughing at something in the movie for like, that last _fifteen_ minutes," Tori explains.  
Jade nods in cool awareness and then proceeds to do that striking, exquisite expression that makes Tori _so_ jealous, and raises _one_ eyebrow skeptically.

"Oh really? Then what is _this_?" she asks bending down to lift a bowl of ravioli from beside Cat.  
"Ravioli Cat? Really?" Cat laughs more.  
"They're like pasta pillows!" she squeals out. Tori's mouth opens in response. Fifteen minutes? For _ravioli?_ Seriously?  
"Cat. Cat. _Cat!_" Jade commands, hand on hip.  
"Whatty?" Cat stops laughing to look up at her attentively. Jade sighs and begins to speak.  
"_In_ the movie, Marley and Me, _Marley_ has an –"  
"Lalalalalalalalalalalala!" Cat screeches, hands over her ears. Jade smiles in achievement as Cat doesn't seem to be in the laughing mood anymore. Sad movies get her every time.

She walks into the room and spots Andre in front of her, starting on his third hot dog.  
"'Ey Gurl!" he greets, almost incomprehenable, from the hot dogs.  
She rolls her eyes to the heavens, in a 'are-you-seriously-going-to-eat-yout-weight-in-bad-quality-meat-products-AGAIN?' kind of way, that hand still placed on her hip and swipes the bowl out from his lap and throws it at Robbie, making him clap his hands in delight.  
"Hey!" André protests. "_My_ hot dogs!"  
"When you're not thirty stone and sleeping in a bathtub, you'll thank me for it." She assures, pulling his dreads fondly, and then looks up, catching the eyes of Beck.

She suddenly freezes, stopping dead, staring back at him, the blood seeming to drop out of her face like she's just been hit.  
"Jade?" Tori asks, concerned with Jade's sudden loss of poise, getting up and touching Jade's shoulder, which she doesn't even seem to notice. "Jade what happened?" Robbie, André and Cat look up at the sound of concern in her voice.  
Jade doesn't respond, just keeps staring at Beck who's looking back at her in confusion, and then swallows uncertainly.  
"Beck?" she whispers. "Are you okay?" She stares at him fearfully.  
He frowns at her, reaching his hand out to take hers.  
"Yeah, I'm fine." He assures. "Jade, what's wrong?" She shakes her head.  
"No. No. No, that's _lie_, something's _wrong _with you. Don't tell me you're fine; it's _obvious_ that you're not. …What's going on Beck?"  
The others frown looking at Jade, wondering if she's into drugs. What was there, that was so _obviously _wrong with Beck? He's been sitting on that chair, laughing at Cat, making fun of Robbie, bantering with Tori, and throwing chips at André like the rest of them. He's fine.

He stares at her but then answers just a _moment_ too late.  
"Nothing's wrong, babe. What are you freaking out for?" he asks unconcernedly. It doesn't fool her.  
She bends down, till she's hunched on the ground, her hands on his lap and her eyes almost at his level, and somehow, all her poised confident manner disappears, with the concern in her eyes and the break in her voice, unnerving Tori, who's never seen her aura just _drop_ like that.  
"Beck." She breathes. "It's _me._ Don't tell me that you're fine, okay, _you're not fine_. I'm not one of your stupid friends that you can ward off with an easy smile and a forced laugh. You're _not_ fine, okay, I _know._ Did… did something happen or…?"  
She trails off, breathing heavily, staring into his big brown eyes that trust her _so_ much, while the whole room is silent and staring and frozen in potential fear. Partly, in case something _is_ wrong with Beck, and partly because none of them have a number for Drugsline handy for Jade.

Beck looks down at their intertwined hands wondering how she possibly could have noticed his ever-so-silent and ever-so-secret distress. But she always knew.  
"Okay." He admits roughly, quietly, looking up into Jade's eyes in submission. "It's not a big deal, it's just… mom got admitted to hospital last night."  
The room froze, like someone had stopped time, as that _awful_ uneasy air filled the space with the question that was on everybody's mind but nobody's lips, in case they wouldn't like the answer. Is she okay?  
Except Cat.

"Is she okay?" she asks clearly, and _bravely_, the others thought, who kept their mouths shut and their eyes wide. But Cat never shied away from questions like that.  
Beck doesn't even look at her, but keeps staring into Jade's eyes, hoping she won't put two and two together.  
"She's fine Cat." He assures. "Well, she will be."  
Beck and Jade don't move, and their eyes are locked in place, as if they can somehow speak through eye contact now, their hands clasped and it looks as if they're in their own private BeckAndJade world, where time has stopped and people talk telepathically.  
And Tori doesn't really want to intrude. But she does.  
"What happened Beck?" she asks sensitively, nervously. Beck opens his mouth to answer, staring at Jade, anxiously like he just got 'caught out' or something. He coughs, hesitating.  
"Uh.. She… she fell down the stairs in the house. She got injured pretty bad." He nods, not breaking eye contact with Jade.

And there it was, Jade's look of recognition as she lets her eyes close and her head drop into his lap, pressing her head against the back of his hands.  
"Beck." She whispers, hushed anguish and tenderness and _oh-christ-almighty_ in her voice.  
"Oh _God_, Beck" she repeats sounding like she's about to cry and André almost gets up to hug her instinctively. Beck pulls her head up and holds it to make her look at him.  
"She _fell_?" she asks. "You mean that he –" He nods, cutting her off.  
"Yeah."  
"…That's why you were being weird about me being at your house, weren't you?" He nods again.  
"Yeah."

She looks at him like he just broke her heart, and he looks at her like someone else broke his and so she gets up from the floor and goes to kneel up onto his chair, each calf on either side of his lap, and wraps her arms so tight around his neck, just trying to make it better, even though it won't help at all. Her hair covers his face, but not his eyes which are wide, and suffering and so full of anguish that no-one can look at them anymore. Beck tightens his hold around Jade's back, her body seeming to mould itself to him, and moves his head until it's nestled into her neck, blocking his eyes from view. Her hands reach up to tangle her fingers in his hair, holding him in place, keeping him with her. Nothing about their embrace seems affectionate or caring at all, just _fierce_ protection and _intense_ passion and just so much _love_.

And right then, a moment of clarity descends upon them all, because, _sure_, at least once in their life have they questioned the concept of 'BeckAndJade.' But there it was, clear as day, and they could see clearly the perfect combination of ying and yang, and black and white, and fire and water, moulded together in perfect harmony. A perfect contrast.

After a long time of _their_ staring, and stillness, and silence, and _their_ holding-so-tight-that-you'll-never-let-go and hands cemented in his hair that say 'I'd do anything to make this better', she lets go of him, to look into his eyes. Jade's hair blocks his face from view and her hands untangle themselves from his hair as she secretly wipes his eyes, and gives him their secret coded nod as if to say 'you're okay. Trust me.' And he does, pulling Jade around so she's now sitting on his lap, and they're facing the others, their hands wrapped around her waist and locked at her hips.

"She'll be okay." He reassures them, though probably very unproductively as they're all staring at him like they found out he's a raging murderer with an intent to slaughter exactly _four_ teenage students. Because his voice is hoarse, and his eyes are insincere and red, and his _vulnerable_ side is showing (thanks to Jade) and anyway, he doesn't _do_ vulnerable. He doesn't _do_ sad, or _self-pitying_, or _distressed_ or _worried_. He's Beck bloody Oliver for Christ's sakes. All he does is calm, and amused, and yeah that's fine.  
"Really she'll be fine." He repeats, more sincere this time. Jade looks down and laughs, freaking everyone in the room out. Did she not get the memo that _no_ laughing should be done right now under absolutely _any_ circumstances?  
"Sorry. I just freaked out, because his mom is like, really good to me y'know …and like she's been more like a mom to me than my own, so …like I just freaked out. Sorry Beck, I went over the top, I was just really worried." He squeezes her hand secretly, in thanks, for giving up her own defences to save his. She knew when to lie for him.

"So …is she still in the hospital?" André voices uncertainly, unsure whether the 'silent' rule was still there about not being able to talk. Beck seems to welcome the question though. Probably anything to make that 'awkward', and 'pity' disappear, and revive his cucumber-cool status.  
"Yeah. She is. I'm not there now because she kicked me out." He laughs, which makes everyone else smile in response. He's laughing! Thank God.  
"She …she didn't want me to see her. Like that" he adds, less funny. Their smiles fade.

Jade looks up, sensing the 'over-the-top' awkward, as she looks at Tori's devastated stare that she knows won't help _anybody_, and André's concerned eyes jumping from hers to Beck's, and Robbie's mouth hanging open that she just can't _stand,_ and Cat's big baby eyes looking worriedly into hers and the muted TV showing images of depressed vampires and girls in bikinis with double D's and aliens with blue face. And with _her_ experiences with matters like this, it tells her that no-one's going to be any help here and turns her head to the side a little, to glance at Beck.  
"Hey babe? You want to take off?" she asks and watches his eyes as he glances over everything she just did, and then to _her_ tight grip on his hands and _her_ long hair concealing half of his face and _her_ big dependable blue eyes and she knows he came to the same conclusion she just did. Let's go.

"Let's go" he suggests and releases hold of her waist in substitution of her hand.  
"We might take off. Thanks for movie Tori." Beck thanks politely. "Even if it was awful." He smiles and winks at her and she giggles uncertainly in response but her face drops back into her familiar pitying expression which makes him _have_ to look away.  
"I hope your mom's okay!" she offers in desperation to make everything okay. But he just nods and smiles and nothing changes.  
"Beck, you call me later yeah?" André asks.  
"Sure thing!" he calls, in a more blasé approach. Cat pads his ankles from the floor, as he walks by, in her attempt to console and Beck smiles and strokes her head with the hand that wasn't clutching Jade's _so_ tightly.  
"See ya later Kittycat." He smiles, making sure she was smiling, because really, if a Cat like _that _smiles at you, you're pretty certain to be at least a little bit better. She grins up at him.  
"Meow meow!" she meows cutely, proving Beck's theory correct, and making Jade roll her eyes.

They reach the door and exit with the usual 'see you later's and 'bye guys' and the unusual 'call me when you hear something's and 'hope your mom's okays', until Beck stops outside the classroom door and remembers that he forgot his jacket.  
Jade looks up at him from her thick framing lashes and says quietly "I'll get it."  
Because she _knows _him and she _knows_ he didn't like being so …_exposed_ in there. So once again, Jade's to the rescue to save face.  
"Sit down on the bench there and wait for me." She orders.  
"Yes ma'am" he agrees, amused. And then "_I love you_", serious. And this, everyone else can hear because Jade has opened the door a crack but Beck doesn't notice, even the muffled "Aww!" of Tori's.  
And Jade says "It's okay", because it's not a 'I love you with all my heart Jade West' or a 'Don't be upset baby, that girl has _nothing_ on you' I love you, but just a, 'Thank you for being here for me' I love you.

She closes the door behind her and proceeds to the chair where Beck was sitting.  
"Jacket." She states, as a form of explanation in response to their confused expressions. _Mostly_ confused.  
"Jade. Are we still going to Gondalas tomorrow?" Cat asks seriously, making Jade shake her head, hiding her secret smile at her friend's top priority.  
"We'll see Cat."  
"Wait, Jade!" Tori grabs her upper arm as she turns to go, making her look down at the contact and then up at Tori, and she let go as if her eyes were full of some fiery devil mind control or something.

"Is …is Beck alright?" she asks nervously and Jade just thinks, God girl, you have no idea what's it's like to have_ anything_ but your own _perfect, adoring, protected _life do you? But instead she says "Uh huh."  
"It's just …well he was here with _us_ for an hour tonight. How come he didn't say anything?" she asks, pulling out her 'confused Tori' expression again. Oh how naïve is this chick? To save _face_ maybe? Y'know maybe the one thing that Beck's like _known for?  
_"Well, maybe he didn't want to spoil your stupid movie." She suggests, not really lying, more white lying, but it's not as if she has a problem with either. I mean it was probably still true anyway. He's cute like that. (But it's not as if it's possible that that movie could be spoiled _anymore_.)  
"But …I just" Tori stammers. "I don't understand what happened. One minute he's fine, laughing and being _Beck,_ and the next -. How did you know something was wrong?" she asks.

Jade's face softens a little as she thinks about it. She doesn't really know and she shrugs.  
"I dunno. It was just something it his body language I guess. Something in his eyes."  
"What was in them?" asks Cat curiously like she's expecting the answer of a 'kiwi' or something.  
Jade shrugs again.  
"I dunno. It was just little things. Like he didn't call to ask where I was, after I didn't arrive here after ten minutes, because he's just normally _so_ overprotective like that. And when he _did_ call, there was just something …_off_ about his voice."  
"But when you walked in you took one look at him and –." André froze, mimicking her reaction, making her laugh and kick him, earning her a pouty expression. He still pressed his point.  
"What did you see when you first saw him then?"

Jade thinks back, not really remembering _one_ thing in particular, it was just his whole manner, his demeanour, was _off._  
"_Well_, I suppose… his hair was pretty slicked back wasn't it? Like he'd been running his hands through it? And his hands were clenched, and he was just all …rigid. Tense." She laughs then. "Not to mention that the taco fries beside him, weren't even _touched_."  
They laugh at the memory of Beck's ability to eat his weight in taco fries when they were at Venice beach that time. No-one even noticed he had eaten them all, until they found the empty box and Beck lying beside it in the sun, grinning impishly.  
Then Jade shrugs looking down.  
"I don't know really. There was just something different in his posture. Something different in his eyes." She shrugs and then half smiles, and continues walking to the door.

"I better go. See ya guys." Her head turns before she disappears through the door and she adds "Enjoy your movie!" smiling sarcastically and mischievously, and the gang automatically grin in response to her rare and somewhat addictive smile.  
She shuts the door and a moment later they hear a car drive off.  
"His poor mother!" Robbie cries and Cat goes over to comfort him.  
André and Tori stare at each other.  
"That was intense." André breathes out.  
"Uh huh." Tori agrees, feeling like she needs to sit down.

"Doesn't she just know him so well?" asks Cat from the second couch sitting beside Robbie. "She just walked in and _zap_! She knew something was wrong with her _cuddle bun_." She grins. "She's knows him so well, it's like she's got _magic eyes_."  
Tori nods in agreement.  
"She _does_ know him so well." André agrees nodding. And then,

"It's like she's got _magic_ eyes."


End file.
